I entered a few images in the Outside Bozeman Annual Photography Contest. It’s the first contest I’ve entered so I’m super happy to take 2nd. According to the magazine more than a thousand photos were entered. Here’s my image that took second in the Landscapes, Amateur 18+ division. If you look closely you can make out the Big Dipper over the Bridgers.

Each time I drive to the park via the Gardiner entrance Emigrant Peak looms in the eastern sky of the Paradise Valley. Emigrant Peak is an impressive geologic structure. It rises steeply more than 6000 feet from the floor the valley. It is a classic, non-technical scramble than rewards climbers with panoramic views of the Beartooth, Gallatin, Madison Range, and Absorka Mountains.

We chose to park at Gold Prize Trail head. To get there follow the road to Dailey Lake and make a left before the dirt road descends to the lake. Follow the through a burned out section of forest. The trail then arcs left and climbs steeply to old jeep track. Follow this section of double track until you spot a creek crossing and trail ascending to the right of a stream. This trail will deposit climbers into a large meadow which slowly ramps up in steepness until a large stand of trees.

From the meadow you have two choices. The route described on SummitPost.org and in Turiano’s Select Peaks will have climbers follow a fence line on climber’s left into the trees. We did this and made our way through the trees. This is somewhat of a pain, as the slope is about 40 degrees and is forest floor, which does not offer the best traction.

The other option to aim for a large rock formation on climber’s right of the meadow. Gaining this formation, scrambling over scree and talus begins very quickly.

Either route will deposit climbers on the northwest ridge. The ridge is made up of easy class 2 scrambling over 40 degree talus. There are a few short class 3 sections where use of your hand is necessary, but these are very easy. The final summit ridge is quite exposed, especially in early season when snow makes the ridge a knife edge with 50 degree slopes to either side of the climber.

Ascent Time: 4 hours

We stayed on the NW ridge to take advantage of the scree and avoid the trees, but otherwise retraced our steps.

Descent Time: 3 hours

II Class 2 (Short section of Class 3 scrambling)

Check out my gallery of pictures from the climb: Emigrant Peak

Mother nature put on a great show last night in Bozeman, MT. A really strong thunderstorm moved through town and over the Bridgers around Midnight. I ran out with my camera and took a bunch of shots. I hadn’t ever shot an electrical storm before, but with a bit of tinkering I was able to grab this shot.

Browsing the net today, it looks like you would ideally shoot in the neighborhood of f/5.6-f/8 using your bulb setting. However, stopping down like in the above picture allowed be to completely black out the foreground and get a bit more contrast in the frame.

I also got a great idea while shooting this storm that I am going to keep under wraps for now. But, be on the lookout for something pretty special in the future!

I had been eying Gallatin Peak for a few years. It is the largest peak visible from Bozeman and looked to be a great peak to ski. With the huge snowpack this spring, I finally got the chance to climb and ski it this past weekend (6/15/08). It’s quite a haul to get in, but the ski descent made it well worth the trip.

The approach from the North Fork trail head was a very long skin in. It probably totals about 9 miles into Bear Basin, where we made camp, and another 3 miles to the summit. Other parties we ran into were skinning in from the Beehive Basin Trail Head to climb the peak as a day trip. In hindsight this appears to be the wise choice.

The route is pretty straight forward from the North Fork Trail Head. The trail begins at 7179′ and descends about 100′ in a half mile to intersect a subdivision. Unfortunately, there is no parking allowed at this intersection. The trail is well built for the next mile and half. After two miles a hiking bridge is crossed over the North Fork River. A well blazed trail continues for another mile until it intersects with the Beehive Basin Trail No. 402. It appeared that the skin track to Beehive Basin was actually about a half mile north of the actual trail. The North Fork trail becomes thinly marked at this point. Just follow the river generally north. The key is to round Mt. 9385 on the west side of the river. After this point continue up Bear Basin. The skin track over the divide breaks off well before (half mile) before the charted trail switchbacks up the divide. After that we skied a wonderful 800′ into the Hell Roaring basin and made our way to the base of the climb just right of the prominent rock buttress on the south face.

We skinned the first thousand feet of the climb before throwing our skis on our packs and kicking steps up to a well defined saddle. From the saddle we climbed the east facing snow field to the summit. This was the steepest part of the climb (~50°). The slope mellows a bit to about 35° for the final 200 feet to the summit.

We skied the same line we climbed due to wet slide danger on the south facing bowl.

IV 50° (Class 3 in Summer) (via North Fork)
III 50° (Class 3 in Summer) (via Beehive Basin)

Check out my gallery of pictures from the climb: Gallatin Peak

I first heard Great Northern on the final stretch of my drive home from college. Bozeman’s 95.1 KMMS was playing the single Telling Lies and at first I thought I was listening to something by the Silversun Pickups. But, when no over the top indie-whine of a chorus came on, I knew I was hooked. Its driving guitar rift is perfectly complemented by a vocal harmony that progresses into a powerful lyrical message.

Indie rock should take a lesson from Great Northern and learn the value of restraint in songwriting. Great Northern’s sound is fresh and wouldn’t be confused for mainstream music in the least. I can only assume that bands like Wilco and Silversun Pickups are striving so hard to not become mainstream trash that they venture too far into indie-land and lose some of the obvious musicality of their work.

If all you heard off of Twilight for Daylight was Telling Lies, you would be denying yourself of a great album. Despite the emo implications of the Our Bleeding Hearts, the track delivers a strong, almost mysterious melody with lyrics that are much more mature than the expected, “I walked into a room and no one will talk to me.”

Other standout tracks include Home, Just a Dream, and Into the Sun. Each, like Telling Lies, finds that delicate balance between indie and listen-ability without ever losing track of the band’s sound.

Unfortunately, some of the band’s sonic momentum is lost toward the end of the album. The Middle is an interesting track. Neither the verses or the chorus are poorly done. In fact, I actually like each part on its own, but the way the song is constructed is just a little disjointed. It sounds like some strange mashup of the Polyphonic Spree and the Hot Hot Heat. Perhaps it doesn’t quite work because I have to be in completely different moods to enjoy the two styles of music. Similarly, the last track Babies doesn’t quite work for me. It’s a haunting lullaby that is infused with too much emotional pain to be simply enjoyable. That said, I imagine that this was the sound that the Band was going for in the track, so their musical talent must be credited.

Final take: Great Northern is a L.A. band to watch out for. Twilight for Daylight strong sophomore release that deserves your ear.

Check them out at greatnorthernmusic.com